Step Up
by Cinderburster
Summary: Starscream gets an impromptu dance lesson. G1


**Summary**: Starscream gets an impromptu dance lesson.

**Disclaimer**: Transformers © Hasbro; the only property that I claim is my own imagination and story… oh, and Slamdancer. She's mine, so no stealing. :)

**Warning**: Some characters may seem a bit OOC. Since most of their personalities are fanon anyway, I tried to make them seem as real to me as I could. My apologies if I diverge from the accepted norm.

**Step Up**

Laser fire sizzled overhead, filling the air with the stench of burnt ozone. There was a rapid popping and the rock at Starscream's feet exploded with molten pock-marks, the acid pellets still liquefying the stone even after impact. An Autobot had snuck up behind him. He whirled, firing at the black-and-white Autobot – he never bothered to learn their names; why name the doomed – even as his olfactory receptors registered the smell of brimstone.

The black-and-white Autobot ducked behind a handy outcropping. Starscream smirked. "That's right, hide you cowardly Autobot scum!" he crowed, reveling in his own glorious might.

The Seeker was so distracted by his own unrivaled prowess in battle that his sensors failed to pick up the footsteps behind him until it was too late. One hand was grabbed and he was yanked around with an undignified yelp of surprise. A smiling femme was holding the hand, and was reaching for the Seeker's free arm.

"Hiya, Hot Stuff. Fancy a twirl about the battlefield?" she said jovially, apparently unaware of the battle still raging around them.

"Unhand me, you crazy –!" Starscream started, but he suddenly found his vocal capacitor incapacitated.

The little femme had slammed him bodily into the outcropping the black-and-white Autobot had ducked behind earlier, taking advantage of the Seeker's temporary imbalance. While his sensors were still reeling from the unexpected method of attack, the femme spun him away from the rock again, keeping a firm grip on his wrists for steering leverage.

Starscream glowered and growled in the back of his audio resonator, powering up the beam guns attached to his forearms. They whined as they powered up, and the femme gave him a good-naturedly disappointed look, like a nanny that had caught her charge coloring on the walls. She grinned and moved in close, raising their arms above their heads as she did so and clicking her tongue admonishingly.

The firearms discharged uselessly into the sky.

There was a distant squawk and a rain of feathers drifted down. A few yards away Jazz looked up at the sky quizzically, then shrugged and rejoined the battle with the decimated bird carcass that had bounced off his helmet forgotten in the dirt beside him.

On the opposite side of the battlefield, Starscream was finding himself forced into a dance the disgusting flesh-beings of this planet referred to as the "tango."

"What are you _doing_ to me, you crazy femme?!" he snarled.

"Teaching you to dance, what does it look like?" she replied.

"_WHY?!_"

"Well, you may be an unholy terror on the battlefield, but I think your evasive maneuvers lack finesse."

"…what?" Starscream asked, temporarily flummoxed out of his rage.

"To put it bluntly, 'Screamer, you're about as graceful as an elephant on roller skates."

"_WHAT?!_"

The femme just grinned, switching to the Lindy while the Seeker fumed.

The sounds of battle had faded Autobots and Decepticons alike gradually realizing that something very strange was happening. Every single Autobot was wearing a slag-eating grin, although it was difficult to tell what was going on behind Optimus' face-guard. His stance communicated quite eloquently that he was prepared to be amused until the situation turned dangerous, however.

The Decepticons watched with a mixture of horrified awe and amusement, one or two of them nudging each other and sniggering. After a second of two of shock while his processors reconfigured themselves to accept what he was seeing, Megatron's mouth snapped shut and set in a grim line.

The Decepticons nearest him backed away hurriedly, lest some of his wrath spill over onto them.

"**STARSCREAM!**"

The dancers froze, the femme finally releasing her death- grip on the Seeker's wrists. He over-balanced and crashed unceremoniously onto his aft. The femme stared innocently at the sky, humming to herself.

"Megatron! I – she – it, it wasn't my fault!" Starscream wailed.

"See ya, Twinkle Toes," the femme said, grinning and winking before slipping back into the ranks of the Autobots.

Megatron stared down at his second-in-command with icy optics until the Seeker began to squirm uncomfortably. After what seemed to Starscream to be an eternity, the Decepticon leader spun on his heel and started to walk away. "Decepticons, retreat!" he commanded. He paused, glancing back over his shoulder disdainfully. "Perhaps Starscream will favor us with a display of his new-found talent back at the base," he added coldly.

-- XD --

Jazz clapped the femme on the shoulder, displaying his usual thousand-watt grin. "Slamdancer, you're something special," he said with a chuckle.

Slamdancer flashed a playful grin of her own. "Aw, naw, I just love to mess with 'Screamer," she said modestly, watching the retreating Decepticons fade from sight. "He's so cute when he's enraged."

"Thought up a good nickname for him yet?"

"Well, I've been toying with a few. How about 'Ickle-intake'?" she said.

"Sniggermuffin?" Jazz suggested thoughtfully.

"Wuverwings?"

Jazz and Slamdancer looked at each other, identical grins on their faceplates before chorusing, "SEXY THRUSTERS!" and collapsing into fits of giggles.

-- End --

_Love it? Hate? ZOMG YOU SLAGGING SUCK NEVER WRITE AGAIN? Tell me!_

**A/N**: Slamdancer doesn't like Starscream that way. I promise. She just likes to mess with people, and she likes to give them embarrassing nicknames. ;) More nicknames to come as her story continues!_  
_


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